Kale Salad with Butternut Squash, Quinoa, and Pumpkin Seeds

Here is another guest post from Lauren Adler Dear. She is a dietetic intern at Beth Israel Deaconess Hospital who is passionate about good food and nutrition! Enjoy her post on one of my favorite veggies, Kale!

I wanted to celebrate the fact that kale was recently deemed a low FODMAP food by the Monash University researchers in Australia! Kale is rich in fiber, vitamin A, and vitamin C. Kale salads seem to be the new rage these days. While I was skeptical of eating raw kale at first, my mom’s recipe for this kale salad won me over. It’s nutty, flavorful, and decadent. Well, as much as kale can be decadent. It’s served with a lovely Lemon-Parmesan Dressing.

I bought a big pack of prewashed, precut kale for only $2.79!

Then I peeled and chopped up half of a butternut squash into ¼ inch size pieces (4 cups total). You could also buy precut butternut squash and cut it into smaller pieces to save time. I tossed it with a little bit of olive oil and salt.

I roasted the squash in the oven at 400°F for about 30 minutes. Yum!

While the squash was roasting I started cooking my quinoa, finely sliced the kale and gathered the rest of my ingredients — parmesan cheese, pumpkin seeds, and fresh oregano. Next, I “massaged” the kale with my hands for about a minute. Yes, I know this sounds strange, but it allows the kale to break down. I bet it would have been even better if I had added some olive oil and salt before hand. If you want to read more about massaging kale, check out this Huffington Post article here.

While the butternut squash was cooling I made the lemon-parmesan dressing with my favorite kitchen tool, the immersion blender. If you don’t have an immersion blender, use a regular blender or a plain old whisk.

I mixed all the ingredients in a big bowl…

Tossed the salad with lemon-parmesan dressing, and served it for lunch!

FODMAPers: Butternut squash is one of the ‘moderate’ FODMAP containing foods–so enjoy in 1/2 cup portion. Since this recipe makes a nice large amount–you could easily have 1/4 of the salad!